Aleksan H. Hakobyan
The migration paths of Hayk’s descendants on Armenian Upland as described by Movses Khorenatsi vividly remind the routes of the first Biaynian kings who conquered the territory of the future Biaynili (Urartu) kingdom in a few decades. This is a new argument to support the hypothesis of H. Karagyozyan and M. Katvalyan, according to whom the formation of the Armenian ethnos has happened bt ethnoconsolidation-ethnomixation of all the various Indo-European and non-Indo-European tribes that inhabited the kingdom of Urartu-Biaynili (=Armenian Upland), and not by ethnoseperation (immediate separation of Armenian language carriers from the Indo-European language community) or by ethno evolution (which means gradual absorption of other inhabitants of the Urartu kingdom by the small Armenian-speaking tribe). The process of ethno consolidation of Armenian people was a result of ethno integration of multi-tribal Urartu kingdom and was completed in mid-7th century B.C. The later formed Armenian legend about the descendants of Gayk shows that a leading role in this process was played by Biaynians themselves, although the language of the newly formed ethnos (with the self-designation – endonym of Hay- Hayo- Armenians) was an Indo-European one namely, the Armenian language spoken by the relative majority of the population of the multi-tribal Biaynian kingdom. Combined with other evidences in historical sources, this legend also shows that the kingdom of Urartu was not “destroyed” by anyone; rather it continued to exist as ‘Eruandean Armenian Kingdom”, which was conquered only by Achaemenid Iran.
